Last week’s lecture at SFU Surrey by Ellen Dunham-Jones (co-author of Retrofitting Suburbia) attracted a good house – and a good review in Novae Res Urbis (by subscription, but worth it):
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NEW LIFE FOR A DEAD ZONE
Burnaby’s expansion plans for Brentwood and redevelopment around Surrey’s King George station are prime examples of how to create new, urban uses in the suburbs, U.S. author and architect Ellen Dunham-Jones said last week. … car-oriented shopping malls and subdivisions now need to make way for more urban, pedestrian- and bike-friendly uses and transit-oriented development.
Using expressions like “dead big-box stores, dying malls and zombie subdivisions,” her approach sounds more like something out of The Walking Dead than what she also calls “instant urbanism” of suburban areas. …
Dunham-Jones said first-ring suburbs — those closer to a city core, such as Burnaby — are often the first ones to need a more urban lifestyle, complete with height and density.
“When they first built their malls and their subdivisions, they loved that downtown was behind them — they were out on the edge,” she said. “And then, they were leapfrogged, and there was a new mall and a new subdivision and they lost some market share and they were leapfrogged again and again and again, and you often see in some places that the first-ring suburbs had older properties, many of which were losing a lot of value.
“And they also were given something incredibly valuable: That same leapfrogging has given them a relative neutrality in an expanded metro. And if they choose, they are now wellpositioned to become a more urban destination.
“Their mindset is that they’re still at the edge, but they’re not now. They’re at the centre, and especially where you see the cities expanding their transit systems. Those become the new centres.” …
Dunham-Jones noted other projects in Metro Vancouver that are following the same example: Oakridge being transformed from a mall into a “mini-city,” Brentwood’s redevelopment (above right)…
“Then there is that sense of instant urbanism,” she said. “I think most of us like cities that have evolved over time — the patina of multiple generations. You feel you’re larger than simply the instant gratification of something like going to the mall.”
The way to avoid that, she said, is through a walkable-block structure.
“We have to figure out how to do a better job of instant urbanism that we’re really proud of,” she said
